So, turret balance

[keith.lamothe]

This is mainly a response to some of the results from this poll which is basically a desire for buff/rebalance of turrets in general.  Specifically in regards to knowledge cost.

Anyway:

1) I would like to establish consistent K costs across the combat turrets, similar to how all mkII combat fleetship unlocks cost 2500, all the "standard" combat starship mkIIs cost 1000, etc.  This doesn't necessarily apply to turrets which do not shoot things, however, as their utility is obviously of a different nature and may not be well served by the same K-cost structure.  The HBC also probably needs a different K-cost structure because it hasn't been normalized to the "every mark has the same cap" and "mk X has health/damage/etc equal to mkI*X" rules (nor do I think there is a need to thus normalize it; it's different and it's cool that way).

2) There seems to be some confusion about the firepower of the turrets.  When I say they're aiming at cap-for-cap 3x a comparable fleet ship I mean 3x bonus dps, not just 3x base dps (as turrets do have the 2.4x multipliers instead of, say, the triangle's 6x, this means the turrets base dps is significantly more than 3x a comparable fleet ship base dps).  For reference (as of 6.022, all stats other than K are for mkI only) :

Unit	Cap	CapHealth	CapBaseDPS	Bonus	CapBonusDPS	CapM	CapC	CapM+C	CapE	K Cost	Notes
Fighter	192	15,915,200	49,000	6	294,000	20,000	20,000	40,000	10,000	0/2500/6000	MkI fleet ships cost 1/2 listed energy
Bomber	192	15,092,000	39,200	6	235,200	140,000	20,000	160,000	20,000	0/2500/6000	MkI fleet ships cost 1/2 listed energy
Missile Frigate	192	15,092,000	47,040	6	282,240	20,000	100,000	120,000	40,000	0/2500/6000	MkI fleet ships cost 1/2 listed energy
Basic Turret	192	14,700,000	235,200	2.4	564,480	115,200	76,800	192,000	20,000	0/750/1500
Laser Turret	192	29,400,000	220,500	2.4	529,200	38,400	172,800	211,200	30,000	0/2500/3500
MLRS Turret	192	19,600,000	205,800	2.4	493,920	172,800	38,400	211,200	20,000	0/2000/3000
Missile Turret	192	9,800,000	264,600	2.4	635,040	153,600	57,600	211,200	20,000	0/3000/4000
Sniper Turret	232	23,500,000	141,000	6	846,000	69,600	348,000	417,600	35,000	0	Uneven bonuses from 4 to 6
Spider Turret	232	23,500,000	141,000	6	846,000	278,400	556,800	835,200	35,000	3000	Uneven bonuses from 4 to 6, does engine damage
Flak Turret	96	24,500,000	420,000	2.4	1,008,000	192,000	38,400	230,400	20,000	0/2500/3000	Has penalties vs Heavy and UltraHeavy MkI hits 6 targets at once (included in listed DPS)
Lightning Turret	96	19,600,000	435,556	4	1,742,222	57,600	134,400	192,000	40,000	0/1500/2000	Uneven bonuses from 2 to 8 Hits 200 targets at once, but can hits individual targets up to 5 times each if there are fewer than 200 in range, so can get max DPS against as few as 40 targets (included in listed DPS)
Heavy Beam Cannon	12	10,200,000	720,000	1	720,000	78,000	132,000	210,000	19,800	500/2500/3000/3000	Has nonstandard cap/dps/etc progressions, these are mkI numbers except for K
Tractor Turret	192	109,760,000	0	0	0	115,200	576,000	691,200	30,000	0/2000/4000
Grav Turret	58	62,640,000	0	0	0	29,000	406,000	435,000	23,200	500/1500/2500

Triangle (and other fleet ship) attack power has crept up since the turret numbers were set up, and the turrets vary significantly from one another and son on, so the actual current firepower comparison in that table is between 1.68x and 2.7x (for just the "core four" turret types of basic/laser/mlrs/missile, the others go higher but are nonstandard in other ways).  But the base-dps numbers for the turrets are much higher, so it depends on whether you're in a defensive situation where everything is in range of enemies with all the normal hull types or where you're facing something more homogenous (like a huge non-schizo wave, or a few really tough combatants from a narrow range of hull types) and whether you have the counters available, etc.

3) MkIV turrets (other than the existing HBC IV) aren't on the table right now.  One of the planned features for the next expansion involves additional turretry in that range, however.  Aside from that, I don't want to pile MOAR TURRETS into the game in the current model because it's already hard enough to present a suitable challenge to the chokepoint-inclined


Anyway, my current guess is to:
a) Make the K cost of basic, laser, mlrs, missile, flak, and lightning all the same.  Basic has a very low cost for historical reasons mainly; it used to be much weaker but has really been buffed up to be in the neighborhood of the others (it's still weaker overall, but not by much).
b) Buff the cap health of the basic, laser, mlrs, missle, sniper, spider, lightning, and flak to about 40M, putting it in the 2x-to-3x range compared to fleetships (which tend to vary from 10M to 25M with some outliers), similar to its dps.
c) Make the bonuses even on:
-- flak (remove its penalties vs heavy and ultraheavy, leave existing bonuses at 2.4)
-- lightning (set all bonuses to 4, maybe add 1 or 2 additional bonus types since Refractive and Neutron are kind of lame, and replace Artillery since it currently gives it the amusing distinction of a bonus against a triangle ship it cannot hurt)
-- sniper and spider (set all bonuses to 6)
d) I'm unsure on this one, but there appear to be a lot of complaints about the low bonuses on the turrets (2.4 is the "standard"), with a preference for the kinds of bonuses the triangle gets (6), so I could change all the 2.4 ones to 6 while dividing the base dps by 2.  That would be a moderate buff to bonus dps and a significant nerf to base dps, but that appears to be what's being asked for from some folks.

e) Given the above, determine what people think is a fair K cost for "a mkI cap" of immobile firepower, and apply that to a) above.  There appears to be consensus that 2500K is a good cost for a mkII triangle or bonus fleet ship, so roughly speaking it seems 1250 is a fair price for "a mkI cap" of mobile firepower (I know 1 mkII cap is more than 2 mkI caps in many senses, but it's closer to 2 than 3 in actual practice).  The question is how "immobile" and "2x to 3x the hp, 2x to 3x the dps" (which turrets would then have, more or less, compared to triangle ships) affects the value.


Thoughts?

[Faulty Logic]

This is mainly a response to some of the results from this poll which is basically a desire for buff/rebalance of turrets in general.  Specifically in regards to knowledge cost.

No. The turrets were only an honorable mention. It's just that the discussion was almost all about them.

But turret rebalance is definitely worth doing.

I don't think turrets are all that far from where we want them. They are just a bit too expensive in terms of k. A mkII turret (and its corresponding drone) is usually worth about 1500 k to me.

But in games with exos, especially against a single choke, immobile firepower is almost as good as mobile firepower, so tread carefully.

[keith.lamothe]

This is mainly a response to some of the results from this poll which is basically a desire for buff/rebalance of turrets in general.  Specifically in regards to knowledge cost.

No. The turrets were only an honorable mention. It's just that the discussion was almost all about them.

But turret rebalance is definitely worth doing.

I was looking at the vote count rather than the announced winners, 23 out of 41 voting for "Turrets in general" (with the highest other option having 26 out of 41) is what I mean.  But yea, either way, I think a general look at these is a good idea.

[keith.lamothe]

I don't think turrets are all that far from where we want them. They are just a bit too expensive in terms of k. A mkII turret (and its corresponding drone) are usually worth about 1500 k to me.

But in games with exos, especially against a single choke, immobile firepower is almost as good as mobile firepower, so tread carefully.

So, a mkII triangle ship is worth 2500K to you, but a mkII turret is only worth about 1500K, despite the fact that the turret (generally speaking) has about 2x the dps.  Is there more going on there than just the immobility to explain the difference in valuation?  In the situation of "single-choke vs exos" would you be willing to pay 2000K or 2500K for them (not that the costs can be variable like that, just as a thought experiment)?

[Faulty Logic]

So, a mkII triangle ship is worth 2500K to you, but a mkII turret is only worth about 1500K, despite the fact that the turret (generally speaking) has about 2x the dps.

Yes, generally.

Is there more going on there than just the immobility to explain the difference in valuation?

No. Mobility is huge, both in getting the max dps on defense, and contributing to the victory criterion. Without drones, it would only be worth about 1000 in the general case.

In the situation of "single-choke vs exos" would you be willing to pay 2000K or 2500K for them (not that the costs can be variable like that, just as a thought experiment)?

Yes (in fact, I do typically unlock mkII turrets against moderate exos (SC/Golem intensity 4, early FS 4)). With exos, defensive firepower is more valuable, especially with just one choke, and especially especially at the finale of fallen spire.

But I think making turrets situationally good in the base case (and thus especially good against exos) would be ideal. Exos could get some anti-turret ships to compensate (hello, H/Ks).

Edit: you know, I think exos could really benefit from some variation of the ingress-point rule waves have. Current strength would be for 2 ways in, ~60% for many ways in, and ~130% for single-entry. (That is, to get to important stuff. It would ignore strategically barren planets, to prevent cheese).

[TechSY730]

I don't think turrets are all that far from where we want them. They are just a bit too expensive in terms of k. A mkII turret (and its corresponding drone) are usually worth about 1500 k to me.

But in games with exos, especially against a single choke, immobile firepower is almost as good as mobile firepower, so tread carefully.

So, a mkII triangle ship is worth 2500K to you, but a mkII turret is only worth about 1500K, despite the fact that the turret (generally speaking) has about 2x the dps.  Is there more going on there than just the immobility to explain the difference in valuation?  In the situation of "single-choke vs exos" would you be willing to pay 2000K or 2500K for them (not that the costs can be variable like that, just as a thought experiment)?

Yes, immobility is that huge of a disadvantage, that even with 3x or so cap bonus DPS and around 4x cap heath, even then I wouldn't nessecarily want to pay the same knowledge costs.
Immobility is a HUGE, ENORMOUS opportunity cost. As I'm sure that buffing up stats in line with how severe a penalty not being able to move is would result in very silly, stupidly powerful turrets, bumping down the knowledge costs in comparison to the mobile fleetship stuff seems like a better approach.

Also, I'd rather not have huge bonuses with in return for a nerf in base DPS. Average bonuses seem a bit too high in this game already.
Maybe bump up bonuses to 3x (maybe, 4x, or possibly 3.5x), and adjust base DPS so that the bonus DPS ratio vs fleet ships is maintained. Anything higher than 4x seems to go into crippling overspecialization territory.

[Zeyurn]

I don't think turrets are all that far from where we want them. They are just a bit too expensive in terms of k. A mkII turret (and its corresponding drone) are usually worth about 1500 k to me.

But in games with exos, especially against a single choke, immobile firepower is almost as good as mobile firepower, so tread carefully.

So, a mkII triangle ship is worth 2500K to you, but a mkII turret is only worth about 1500K, despite the fact that the turret (generally speaking) has about 2x the dps.  Is there more going on there than just the immobility to explain the difference in valuation?  In the situation of "single-choke vs exos" would you be willing to pay 2000K or 2500K for them (not that the costs can be variable like that, just as a thought experiment)?

I dislike immobile turrets (even though I use them) because of the rise of radar dampening on almost everything seriously dangerous meaning you can't put turrets at optimal ranges to avoid them being shot by incoming enemies.  If turrets were immune to radar dampening this would be a huge boost.  I don't understand why starships all have radar dampening anyway, so this may be just my problem with the core mechanic  (It makes otherwise smart ships charge an enemy blob and just die if you have them on FRD and don't pay attention, even if you have retreat ranges set)

That said I think 1.5k/3.0k is fair for turret costs, and even 2/3k is alright.  In games where turret unlocks get you 'moar stuff' (Fallen Spire, Spire Corvettes, etc) the knowledge cost is more fair but I'm not sure it's good to balance around that.  I'd rather the turret unlocks just be useful in and of themselves.  As it stands I would rather just unlock forts/HBC and use mobile military to handle the rest.

I also disagree with high bonuses over base dps.  I prefer how they are now.  I would just like to see turrets in general have smaller caps and be tougher and stronger individually.

My analysis of the statistics page is that Missile and Lightning turrets are far superior to everything else right now if you don't have to deal with radar dampening on the missiles.  In serious attacks all the turrets but missile will die real fast, but the lightning ones still get off one initial powerful salvo that does crazy damage to big waves (and if I deploy hardened force fields I can usually get a second salvo) . Forts are always happy but they're not turrets.  I'm ignoring the HBC because it's still probably overpowered and amazing for what you get for researching it.

[TechSY730]

Yes, radar dampening is a bit too freely distributed right now (especially with the Zenith and Spire starships). This is hurting the turrets quite a bit.
I have mentioned this in the past, but I think the Zenith starship's radar dampening should be weakened some, and the Spire starship's radar dampening should just go away. And maybe the fleet starship's radar dampening could be weakened as well, but not as much as the Zenith starship's. The raid starship should stay as is with it's radar dampening, and no other starship types (except maybe warbird, and that is a maybe) should have radar dampening.


I don't think giving all turrets radar dampening immunity is the way to go, but maybe giving some of the more specialized ones might (the heavy beam cannon? flak turret?)

[Zeyurn]

The flak turret already has to be practically on top of things to shoot them, I don't see why it would need to be radar dampen immune.

The HBC is also already overpowered and I don't think needs any buffs.

The missile turret is long range so I can accept it being awful against radar dampening (except the dang starships)

Laser/MLRS are the turrets I would consider weak (Basic are so cheap who cares atm, but if you balance them out they could use something too)

[KDR_11k]

I think radar dampening should be limited to ships that are intended as fortification breakers so they can engage only a smaller part of the enemy defenses at once and won't take too much damage on approach (e.g. Siege Tower). It should be much rarer than it is.

My problem with turrets as someone who doesn't have chokepoints very often is that when you need to scatter them around your territory their small numbers on each planet leave them as little more than a nuisance to the AI since even with 3x the cap DPS a tenth of a turret cap won't stand up to three caps of fleetships (a small wave), it won't even make a dent. However a fleetship can always focus its entire cap on the planet that's under attack, plus you get higher marks more readily (MkII is a freebie for ARS unlocks and with FacIV you can make up to MkIV while turrets always cost even for MkII and unlocking MkIII doesn't give you nearly as much of a bonus as a MkIII fleetship unlock). Also you cannot afford getting all those turrets up to MkII or III anyway, you gotta pick and choose and since there are so many types of turrets the increase to your turret power from unlocking one type isn't nearly as much as the increase in your fleet power from unlocking one of your few fleetships at MkII.

[keith.lamothe]

So, roughly assigning a "1.5x" value to having "2x-ish DPS" (if that were true, presumably you'd be willing to pay 1000K for a cap of mkII turrets that did half the damage they do now but have the same HP and everything else... so maybe that's not true), that means that a mobile "just shoots thing" unit is worth (2500/(1500/1.5)) = 2.5x a unit that's exactly the same except for being immobile.  In other words, an immobile unit is worth 40% the K of an equivalent mobile unit.  Not that I'm going to treat that as a hard-and-fast number or whatever, but does that sound right?

Of course, that doesn't factor in the drone part of the equation.  I'm not sure how heavily people use drones.


On the bonuses thing, so 6 sounds too high.  I'm fine leaving it at 2.4.  But I think I'll boost the 2.4s to 3x (25% increase) with a 10% nerf to base damage.

Edit: you know, I think exos could really benefit from some variation of the ingress-point rule waves have. Current strength would be for 2 ways in, ~60% for many ways in, and ~130% for single-entry. (That is, to get to important stuff. It would ignore strategically barren planets, to prevent cheese).

Hmm, I'd be willing to go for that, though identification of "cheese planets" is tricky.  What if you take a choke which has three "external" (further from your HW) neighbors and you take all three of those planets but only hold them with miniforts or whatever as speedbumps?  But those three planets have no way to your HW except through the choke.

I dislike immobile turrets (even though I use them) because of the rise of radar dampening on almost everything seriously dangerous

I don't think it's quite that bad The following have it:

Flagships
Zenith Starships
Spire Starships
Raid Starships
Spire Stealth Battleships
Space Planes
Raider Guardians
Neinzul Champs

And a few minor faction units:

Marauders
Mining Golems
Roaming Enclaves

And the following that the AI isn't using, or isn't using against your turrets:

Forts
Scout Starships
Enclave Starships
Resistance Fighters
Hive Golems
(most) Turrets
Scouts
AI Guard Posts

So I don't mind giving turrets immunity to radar dampening if it actually helps; the starships having radar dampening is more for the benefit of human players.  This would be a nerf to the usefulness of the SSB and Space Plane for AI use, but I'm guessing that won't make anyone cry in their beverage.

Or I could just take radar dampening off the Flagship, Zenith Starship, Spire Starship, and Raid Starship

Edit: bear in mind sniper/spider turrets already have immunity to radar dampening.

[KDR_11k]

Flagships and alien starships are mainline combat units, they probably don't need dampening. With Raids it makes sense as they need some ability to avoid combat

[keith.lamothe]

Flagships and alien starships are mainline combat units, they probably don't need dampening. With Raids it makes sense as they need some ability to avoid combat

Ok, unless there's some strong objection, Flagships, Zenith Starships, and Spire Starships will no longer have radar dampening for the next release.

[TechSY730]

I don't think it's quite that bad The following have it:
(stripped due to copy-pasta below)

Alright, limiting myself to mobile things the AI can use (things like AI guard posts having radar dampening, while another lesser "beef" of mine, is not relevant to this discussion)

Here is my opinion

Zenith Starships: Keep, but weaken it a good amount (it should keep it some to reinforce it's defensive role, but it shouldn't be huge, like, a missile turret at 3/4 or 2/3 range should be able to still hit it)
Flagship: Keep, but weaken it moderately (don't nerf it as much as the zenith starship though) (it should keep it because the flag ship is supposed to be the most "support" oriented ship, and one of the weakest in terms of absolute stats. Make it such that, say, a basic turret at full range should be able to still hit it. Also, the flagship Mk. I still doesn't "group" properly with the higher marks in the side bar)
Spire Starships: Get rid of radar dampening
Raid Starships: Keep as is
Spire Stealth Battleships: Keep, but radar dampening range should be no less than its weapon range (remember, less radar dampening range is more powerful) (If it already is, then just leave as is)
Space Planes: Keep, but on the fence about range (on one hand, having a weapon range > RD range gives it an interesting use. On the other hand, it makes it very annoying to fight on the defense)
Raider Guardians: Keep as is, by same virtue of the raid starship
Neinzul Champs: Keep, not sure about range (particularly because I don't know it)

Marauders: Keep, but maybe slightly increase range (which would weaken RD) (If this happens, the same adjustment should happen to the resistance fighters)
Mining Golems: Not sure
Roaming Enclaves: Keep, both minor faction and human (make sure the enemy to all and ally to AI enemy to human ones is in sync with the ally to human ones)

[TechSY730]

Flagships and alien starships are mainline combat units, they probably don't need dampening. With Raids it makes sense as they need some ability to avoid combat

Ok, unless there's some strong objection, Flagships, Zenith Starships, and Spire Starships will no longer have radar dampening for the next release.

I have a moderately strong objection to the flagships.

My proposed radar dampening range for Zenith starships would be so severe a nerf that in many cases it would be as if it didn't have it at all, so that isn't a huge deal.

Hooray for Spire starships losing it!